


Dagon's Mid-Week City Break

by Daegaer



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angels, Coffee, Crowley's Bentley (Good Omens), Demons, Forgery, Gen, Hell, Humor, Letters, London, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-05
Updated: 2019-10-05
Packaged: 2020-11-24 08:11:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20904446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daegaer/pseuds/Daegaer
Summary: Dagon just isn't appreciated. Now Crowley has to deal with that fact.





	Dagon's Mid-Week City Break

Dagon looked at the files piling up, then looked at the files shooting in through the Extremely Modern system of pneumatic tubes, then frowned at the scurrying secretarial demons depositing even more files to be approved/rejected/delayed/all of the above in the pigeon hole marked _Do Not Even Think Of Putting Something Here – Dagon_. Among all the incoming files were absolutely none from Beelzebub, who had been taking a hands and insects off policy for what seemed liked centuries.

"You. Get me a coffee."

"Yes, Lord Dagon!" The demon attempted to bow, dropped all the files, picked them up in a random order and stuffed them into a folder marked _Black Dogs and Other Animal Manifestations_. Dagon idly looked inside. They were requisitions for imports of Marie Celeste cooking sherry for the end of millennium celebrations drinks. Huh. _Someone_ had a big budget. Filing's budget never increased. Maybe it would, if Beelzebub ever bothered looking at things.

_Salvation, this was boring. And infuriating._ Sign forms, stamp forms, drink coffee, ignore the poison in the coffee.

"It's got more taste than usual."

"From - let's see – an Earth institution called _McDonald's_, Lord Dagon."

"Who do they sacrifice to?"

"I'm not sure, my lord. Possibly Mammon?"

Trust Mammon to get the money _and_ the souls from the coffee, Dagon thought. Greedy bastard – maybe Beelzebub was more interested in the Finance Department now. After everything they'd been through – Dagon bit through a thick file in frustration.

"My lord? Another infinity of forms have come in requiring your signature?"

"Oh, fuck _that._"

Dagon gulped down the rest of the coffee, pulled out a stack of blank equipment requisition forms, signed the top one, stamped it _Approved_, and vanished from the office.

* * *

Crowley's attention was drawn to the crowd of people holding up phones outside Selfridges. Perhaps there was a new and totally over the top window display inciting avarice that he could claim the credit for, he thought, sliding through the crowd.

"Excuse me, yes, thank you, ladies, if you don't mind," he murmured, making his way to the front, and stopped, appalled.

" – the innate wormlike behavior and cowardice of the human male," Dagon declaimed, breaking what was clearly the last of ten object lessons on the hands of the man cowering on the ground. "Ah, Crowley! Is there something wrong with my material body?"

Crowley had the unpleasant sensation of exactly what it was to be like a bird caught in a snake's gaze. He had to say he didn't like it, and resolved not to meet any more birds' eyes for at least a week.

"No?" he said meekly.

"This mortal felt the need to test the resilience of its buttocks and mammary glands by fondling and squeezing them with some force. I found this impertinent. Is this something that mortals often do?"

"They're all filthy bastards!" a woman with a cut-glass accent yelled from the crowd.

"Maybe I should eat his eyes," Dagon mused, and everyone cheered.

"Please don't," Crowley said as the cowering man started wailing and cringing even more. _Honestly,_ Crowley thought, _make yourself look more appetizing, why don’t you?_

"Could we possibly, _possibly_ make ourselves invisible to the humans?" Crowley hissed as quietly as he could.

Dagon looked down what Crowley supposed was currently _her_ nose at him. 

"Why? Can't you see the humans are worshipping me for punishing this fool for his temerity?" She gave the crowd a far too toothy smile. "Aren't you, girls?"

As the crowd cheered again and Dagon began to give an ex tempore battle speech on the theme of _Rise up, O Womankind (and Behold your New God)_, Crowley stealthily dragged her victim round the corner.

"Get lost," he suggested, "before your eyes and other bits get eaten. And I am _not_ being metaphorical." He kicked the fleeing man in the arse for good measure, just for being stupid enough to have groped a demon in the first place, and waited for the rapturous applause for Dagon to die down.

"There you are," Dagon said, appearing at last. "This city is almost as crowded as Hell. It's not as hot though."

"No, it's only 34 degrees today," Crowley said. "It's practically freezing. Why are you here, if it's safe to ask?"

"I suddenly thought, _Dagon, you incredible example to all the workers down here, you haven't taken a single day off since the Rebellion. Go home early. Or take a city break._ So I came up here."

"On a city break," Crowley said.

Dagon favoured him with a smile that was even toothier than before. "Actually, I just couldn't be arsed looking at one single solitary form more. And if you ever repeat that, you'll end up as one of my filing clerks on eternal office duty. I want a guided tour. I want worshippers. Things haven't been the same since the fall of Philistine civilization."

"Trust me," Crowley said, "London's full of Philistines. And tourists. The same thing, really." He gingerly offered his arm, vaguely remembering that it had been polite to do so with ladies of one's acquaintance the last time he'd bothered being acquainted with ladies. "Shall we go sightseeing, Lord Dagon?"

Dagon regarded his offered arm like a particularly unappealing snack, then slid her arm through his. 

"Onward," she said. "We'll take your horseless carriage."

"An excellent idea," Crowley said, guiding her back towards where he'd parked and shoving down the terrifying thought of Dagon on a tourist bus. He handed her into the Bentley gallantly and peeled away down Oxford Street pointing out shops, cute souvenirs and Australians.

"I have a question," Dagon said as they cut around a bus, braked suddenly as a cyclist shot under Crowley's nose (he really didn't like cleaning couriers out of the headlights) and then took off between two black cabs, which rather surprised the drivers, who had been chatting to each other at the time.

"Yes, Lord Dagon?"

"Why are the humans screaming and pointing?"

"Appreciation of proper driving skills."

"Good. Bow down, pedestrians!"

An hour later they had shot past most of the major tourist sites, with Dagon leaning out the window to snap pictures on a trendily retro camera that Crowley had conjured up. He was wondering what exactly to do with his unwanted guest; the idea of Dagon staying in his flat just couldn't be borne. It wasn't just the presence of random incriminating items filched from churches or inscribed _A Merry and Peaceful Christmas, dearest C. From A,_ or even the coffee-table astronomy book with the entry on Alpha Centauri marked with a long, white feather. It was more the fact that Dagon was infamous for the mess left in other people's bathrooms and the overwhelming stench of rotting seaweed that would be hard to get out of the soft furnishings. On the other hand a senior demon left unsupervised in a London hotel could cause all sorts of trouble. But the smell would be someone else's problem. 

"Have you thought about dinner?" he said.

"Yes. I believe there is a place dedicated to Mammon called _McDonalds_? I want to see it."

Crowley stared glumly out the windscreen and slowed to a mere fifty miles an hour in sheer depression. Then he decided there were worse things he'd done in the service of Hell than eat a burger, and sped up again.

"Of course. Right away."

* * *

"This is definitely one of ours," Dagon said in approval, looking at the unforgiving overhead strip lighting, the parents wearily placating children with burgers and the truly enormous pile of food on the trays Crowley had brought back to the table. She demolished several burgers of various types, sneered at the fries as being insufficiently meat-based and warily drank a chocolate milkshake. After which she quite happily drank several more.

Once a frightening amount of food had vanished into Dagon's maw, inciting no little envy in many of the human women looking at her trim material body, Crowley drove to a boutique hotel in Chelsea. Perfect, he thought. Not _too_ close to his flat, but he could drive there in a few minutes. (_Crowley_ could. He was betting on having at least twenty minutes warning of Dagon coming the other way.) A suite was available, and he handed over his credit card without even asking the price. They obediently followed the _very_ helpful girl out to the mews where she pointed out all the facilities of the suite, with its large bed, comfortable sofa and desk and – most importantly – private entrance onto Pavilion Road. You never knew when you'd need to make a quick getaway, in Crowley's experience.

"Let me show you how to use the TV," he said, when they were alone at last. "It's really quite incredible, you get a real feel for humans by watching what they find entertaining. And the news, of course. You should see what's been going on with the government here –"

He fiddled with the remote until a news programme came up. Almost at once Krishnan Guru-Murthy interrupted his own report on politicians defecting from party to party and looked straight out of the screen with an irritated scowl on his face.

"CROWLEY. WHY ARE YOU SO BLOODY HARD TO FIND SOMETIMES?"

"Urk," Crowley said, turning the volume down. He had a sudden cold feeling. He suspected it might have something to do with the fact that the suite had filled all at once with seawater up to his knees. Dagon was nowhere to be seen, though there was a faint splashing noise under the chest of drawers.

"STOP PREPARING TO LIE AND JUST ANSWER: HAVE YOU SEEN DUKE DAGON ANYWHERE?"

"No," Crowley said, looking around ostentatiously. "I can honestly say I have no idea where Dagon is. Er – how do you lose the Under-Duke of the Seventh Torment, _anyway?_"

"SHUT UP, CROWLEY. AND DON'T EVEN THINK OF SAYING _THEN HOW CAN I ANSWER?_ IF YOU _DO_ SEE DUKE DAGON, INFORM THEM THAT THEIR DEPARTMENT NEEDS THEIR ATTENTION – with the resignation announced of yet another cabinet minister –"

Crowley switched off, quickly. Beside him Dagon surfaced out of the shallow water, long red hair plastered down and streaming, and scales glistening on her face. 

"Let the lazy bastards find out what it means to do some work for a century or two," she said. "Then they'll appreciate me properly."

"A century or two?" Crowley said, wondering if his voice had really sounded as squeaky as he thought. It must be the humidity.

"I'll give you a permission slip to ease up on the tempting," Dagon said. "You'll have plenty of time to look after me." She clicked her fingers and the water vanished, though unfortunately, not the seaweed smell.

"Thank you," Crowley said. "I'll, er, pick you up tomorrow morning. We can – go to the zoo? Maybe the Tower of London? If you wanted to pick up some nice jewels?"

"Not too early," Dagon said. "I'm planning on trying out this _sleeping in_ thing the humans like so much."

"Excellent choice. Well, ciao."

He fled, and drove straight to Soho. Aziraphale's shop had been closed for hours, of course, possibly for days, but he had no time to waste on niceties like calling ahead, or knocking, or just standing outside and trying to think of what exactly, he was going to say. Instead he just shoved the door open and strode in, ignoring the bell's surprised tinkle.

"Aziraphale, we've got a problem, you need to get rid of a senior demon, have you any _idea_ how much it's going to cost when the hotel sees that water damage, and you need to track down about thirty humans who videoed the whole earlier thing and it's probably on YouTube now _anyway_ -"

"Um," Aziraphale said, looking up from his tea and crossword. "Pardon?"

Crowley took a deep breath and explained the events of the day. Aziraphale wordlessly went and got a mug and poured him a cup from the still miraculously hot pot, and watched sympathetically as he threw the steaming tea back.

"We can't have a powerful demon running around the city menacing the population," he said.

"What, like I'm not a powerful demon?"

"You know what I mean. Can't you engineer some sort of emergency back in the office?"

Crowley looked at him in despair. "Have you _seen_ the office? It's always an emergency. She's avoiding it because she's bored with the constant emergencies. If it's any consolation I think she might only plan on menacing men at the moment."

"Hang on, _she_?" Aziraphale said. "That's not how I remember Dagon from the Iron Age."

"I suppose she currently fancies a change. And also fancies new worshippers – let me see if I can find the video of her earlier." It was, as he had feared, on YouTube. Aziraphale held his phone like a bomb that was about to explode and watched in prim disapproval.

"Goodness. I really don't think I can allow senior members of Hell to show up and try to canvas for worshippers. Not outside _Selfridges_."

"Well, no, of course," Crowley said. "I mean, Poundland would be one thing –"

"Yes - _no_, Crowley. That's not what I meant!"

"Of course not," Crowley said, feeling quite cheered by being able to get on Aziraphale's nerves. "Oh, come on, can't you give me a hand?" He gave the angel his very best smile, and for good measure looked over his glasses. Aziraphale didn't even try to fight off his demonic wiles for half a second before giving in.

"I – well – oh, all right. You're sure Dagon isn't going anywhere until morning?"

"No, but everyone is a bit tired when they come up for the first time in ages, especially if they eat as much as we did."

"I hardly call that _eating_," Aziraphale muttered.

"Angel, I had to keep pace with her! I ate like I haven't in _centuries_, and it was _fast food_. You're not going to change your mind about helping, are you?"

He looked at the angel pleadingly; Aziraphale was dreadfully fond of him, he knew that - surely he'd find help here.

"You poor boy," Aziraphale said with a shudder, then, with rather more determination in his voice. "I want to see the originals of all your reports to and communiqés from Hell for the past five hundred years."

"You what? Don't you trust what I've been telling you?"

"Oh, of _course_," Aziraphale said airily. "I'll still want the originals. As soon as possible, please. You get them, and I'll order some food in."

"Ugh, nothing for me," Crowley said.

"You can't call what you ate _food_. Just a little? For me?"

"Maybe a sorbet. Made with gin. I'll be back within thirty minutes."

"I'd say _Drive safe_, but what's the point?" Aziraphale said sunnily, and shooed him out the door.

When he returned Aziraphale had set out plates of tandoori chicken and bowls of rice and chutney.

"Food first," Aziraphale said, steering him to a chair and pressing him gently down.

"You are kidding me," Crowley said. "I really can't."

"It's just a snack. I'd _prefer_ to go out, and maybe we can later. But for now –" He gestured towards Crowley's plate.

Crowley sat with a sigh, ate one mouthful and politely put his knife and fork down. 

"Lovely," he said with his mouth full. He chewed grimly and swallowed. "Dear sweet Sa- um. I'm done." He watched Aziraphale eat his dinner, and combatted the urge to curl up and go to sleep. Finally, _finally_ the angel was finished.

"I have a gin and lemon sorbet," Aziraphale said. "It's _terribly_ refreshing."

"Angel, please! Why do you want my paperwork? How are we getting out of this?"

Aziraphale cleared everything away, washed the table down and picked up the briefcase of papers. He began to shuffle through the paperwork, coughing slightly at the smell of sulphur.

"You think Dagon is up here due to too many emergencies?" he said, scanning centuries of lies.

"She said something about not wanting to see one single form more. So – boredom? Lack of appreciation? I was threatened with the visit going on for a century or two until a proper sense of appreciation had developed back in the office."

"Hmmm. And you don't think that an office emergency would do it."

"Absolutely not. It'd be shuffled off onto someone else's desk."

Aziraphale began laying the papers out in heaps, century by century. Some of the older ones were signed in the flaking rusty brown of dried blood. The newer ones were signed using a red, chisel-nibbed marker. Down Below still loved their Chancery Hand, but Crowley had long since got over opening a vein to finish his paperwork off properly.

"Your superiors have _terrible_ handwriting," Aziraphale said, peering at the notes Crowley had received over the years. "As for the way they annotate each other –" he sighed sadly.

"Oh, well, I'm sorry their writing isn't up to celestial standards," Crowley said, feeling oddly protective. "It's not like I ever actually read any of those anyway, so it was never a problem for me. These days they just interrupt the radio or TV."

"What did you look at today?" 

"What? What's that got to do with anything? Shops, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Brexit protestors, more shops, crowds of tourists, bloody _McDonalds_, you know all the usual. From the outside. _Especially_ the humans. I thought we'd hit the museums tomorrow. Don't be too alarmed when you read the newspaper."

"Did your guest like anything in particular?"

"I can't make chit-chat right now. Come _on_, Aziraphale."

The angel blinked at him mildly and he sighed.

"We spent a lot of time examining window displays and talking about how much accessories cost these days, and there was something said about how Beelzebub would like the palace, being a prince. I made some harmless joke about _Isn't a broken camp bed in the back of the men's toilet block princely enough_ and got punched in the head for some reason." He rubbed his head, thinking about the interesting effect of seeing stars at midday. "Everyone jokes about the higher-ups, I don't know what Dagon's problem is."

"Ahh, I see. I'm going to write a recall notice with some official appreciation," Aziraphale said. "I think it will remove our new demon problem and just leave me with my usual demon problem." He smiled fondly.

"Problem. That's nice," Crowley said, but found hope blooming within him. "You think you can copy the style of Hell's official paperwork, then?"

"I think I can do better than that, dear boy." Aziraphale looked from paper to paper and then carefully wrote a line of spiky, near-illegible text on the back of the take-away receipt.

"_I'm a cloud of poo-eating insects_," Crowley read, and grinned. It wasn't exact, but not bad for a first effort. If he weren't paying attention he really would think it was Beelzebub's handwriting.

* * *

The next morning was fraught. Crowley collected Dagon at eleven and sat watching a rather large breakfast being devoured. It was sad, really, he thought. Everyone made an idiot of themselves when they first came up. He had a clear memory of causing some severe damage in the Garden before remembering that everyone else was a vegetarian and he needed to fit in. After that he'd made an absolute pig of himself with the fruit salads; the pigs had never spoken to him again for traducing their good name.

"These shop windows indicate that human women currently like calf-length skirts and improbable handbags," Dagon said, peering out at the blur of shops and shoppers as they sped by. "They should become holy symbols in my new religion."

"I believe the improbable handbags always are holy, Lord Dagon," Crowley said, cutting off a police car, "but the skirt length changes every few months. It's _fashion_, you see. It changes faster now than in the Iron Age."

"Hmm. Find me a set of scriptures to corrupt."

Crowley snapped his fingers and summoned the current _Vogue_ from the nearest newsagents. He had a few minutes peace as Dagon flipped through it, murmuring in pleasure at the pictures and prices.

"My worshippers will need to be wealthy, or at least avaricious of wealth," she said happily. "And well dressed! None of that hanging round in yellow rags and masks like Hastur's morons." She flipped on a couple of pages. "Hello – what's this –"

Crowley peered over. There was a folded parchment sheet tucked into an artistic photospread of girls wearing clothes they'd have to save for an entire lifetime to afford. It looked old, and dingy, and smelled pretty bad. Fairly sulphurous in fact. He fixed his widening eyes on the road as Dagon unfolded it. _Nice one, Aziraphale,_ he thought, followed by _I hope it's from Aziraphale_. There was silence beside him as Dagon read. It was probably why she was Lord of the Files, he thought, to distract himself from worry. Hell liked an intellectual who could read without actually sounding the words out. 

"Oh," Dagon said in a small, pleased way.

He peeped sidelong as she folded the page carefully and held it up to her face – he snapped his attention back to the road. He had _not_, he told himself, just seen one of the Lords of Hell smilingly kiss a note. _No one_ did that, not unless it came from, well, _very_ far down, and then the kiss was reverent and subservient, not – not like that. What on Earth?

"I don't have time for mortal issues like museum hopping," Dagon said. "I will require you to carry out some research for me – bring more of these _fashion magazines_ with you when you submit your next report to Head Office. For now, convey me to the Entrance to Hell."

"At once, Lord Dagon!"

Crowley spun the wheel and shot back up the road. They were there in record time, even with a stop on the way for coffee.

* * *

Aziraphale was busily not selling books when Crowley breezed in to report that London was significantly less full of demons than it had been earlier in the morning.

"That _was_ you, wasn't it?" he said, "With the stinky letter?"

"Oh, yes," Aziraphale beamed. "I used rotten eggs. Was it convincing?"

"I'll say. I had to leave the windows down on the way here. What did it say? You wouldn't believe the reaction it got!"

"I just wrote something from Beelzebub requiring your guest's immediate return, that's all. A princely request. Look, I can do the signature really well now –"

He drew a complicated sigil in the margins of the Celestial Observer. It glowed and began to burn through the paper.

"Whoops! Maybe too well –"

"That's brilliant!" Crowley said, visions of many and varied permission slips dancing in his mind. "Anyway, it worked. We're free of that problem, although I think Dagon may be cultivating a serious handbag habit. Come on, I owe you lunch, and you can tell me just how brilliant your wording was."

"Oh, I just copied from some great human writers really," Aziraphale said breezily, getting his coat.

"Uh-huh? Philosophers, political scientists, demagogues? Made it sound like Hell was, if you'll pardon the expression, on fire?" Crowley said, ushering him out.

"Romance novelists, actually," Aziraphale said with a mischievous smile. "And I suppose not _all_ of Hell was on fire for Dagon in it."

Crowley stood with his hand on the car door, stock still in admiration. Then he started laughing. 

"I owe you dinner as well! And lunch for the rest of the month! Get in, angel, and get ready to tell me _everything_."

Aziraphale gave him a wide grin and jumped in.

* * *

"Back, are you?" Beelzebub said, barely looking away from the spectacle of a crowd of demons fighting over the sole remaining available desk in the office. Things had become a lot more violent since Hell had introduced hot-desking. And even more so since hot-desking had been made literal.

"Yes, Lord Beelzebub," Dagon said. "I bring tribute."

A large white cup was carefully placed in front of Beelzebub, who glared at it, and then turned the glare upwards. 

"Bribing me, are you?"

"Yes."

"Good. What is it?"

"The humans call it a venti salted caramel mocha with whipped cream. It's a lot better than the shit we get down here."

Beelzebub slouched back in their throne. "You are aware that a couple of months have gone by down here while you were-" Their eyes, and flies, indicated the cup, " – buying coffee?"

"I was buying coffee for you."

Beelzebub took the cup, took a sip and nodded. Something that could be characterized as less of a scowl settled on their fly-blown face. 

"Good to have you back."

"Good to be back."

"Your department has gone to total shit. Don't run off without warning again. But there's no need to go fix things just yet, stay a while and tell me what you were up to."

Dagon smiled, glad to feel teeth of the proper shape again, and took their place beside the throne, eager to explain the wonders of earthly _fashion_.

* * *

_My dearest Dagon,_

_Although the Halls of Hell are crowded, they seem desolate and empty without your presence. Everywhere I look I see demons of lesser stature and wile; none can advise or console as do you. That you have left is appalling, yet I find that I can only fault you for leaving me. Return, I beseech you, my dearest friend and beloved. Destroy this note, or if you cannot, conceal it on earth. Never so much as mention it to me, even if we seem to be alone. You know we never truly are. Forgive me that I have not used my seal upon this, lest it come under official scrutiny, but be assured that I remain,_

_Yours Eternally,_

_Beelzebub_


End file.
